Midnight Conversation
by Deadly Off Topic
Summary: After a nightmare shared, both Gray Wardens find themselves talking about it.  One shot, pretty short.


By Deadly off Topic

Midnight Conversation

It wasn't the blood and the ice-curling screams that woke him, although Alistair knew it had come pretty close to that. What had him half reaching for his sword and bolting upright with sweat lining his brow and arms, was the Archdemon. Monster! Had it been taunting him in his sleep, threatening to kill him? No. There had been something else - something far worse. Like all dreams however, he found parts already going fuzzy, blurred over as if his mind were trying to protect him from such visual gripping horror. "It's just a bloody dream. It isn't real, I won't let it be real." His voice tasted of remembered pain and despair as he sat there breathing heavily. _Don't try to remember it, don't let it get to you._ Funny thing about dreams, they could feel so real to produce the agonized adrenaline pumping frenzily one moment and then drop you like a rock so you were completely drained the next. Empty.

When Elissa stirred, her body shifting in much the same way his had during his nightmare, Alistair wondered if she was dreaming the same dream. He watched silently, patiently, letting his gaze travel over her half-covered form with concern. It would only be too easy to let himself drift back to earlier thoughts before sleep had taken them both, to drown in the frenzic euphoria that had swallowed them up as they coupled. Something stayed those thoughts, kept him close to the trail end of those vivid dreams. In his, she'd been dying.

"Dream?" How long had she laid there, stormy sea-green eyes staring up at him. Had Alistair simply just drifted away when that half-remembered dream fragment slammed him full-throttle right in the gut? "Aren't they suppose to go away?"

"In time...maybe." Alistair's fingers trailed lightly along the arm whose hand he held, his voice distant, back sliding. "For most it goes away..." His brown eyes, dark in the tent's interior, glanced away. He could see the fire's light flickering outside, wondered absently if Sten or whoever was on watch right now had fed the blaze. It was bright... like it had been in his dreams before the killing had begun. Why did it all come tumbling back at him?

"I- didn't like it." Big understatement there. He could tell it in the way her voice curled around each word, like sour grapes. "I _hate_ these dreams."

He nodded slowly in agreement, suddenly aware that it took a great deal of energy to simply hold back the voices that told him: hold her, bury your face in her shoulder... cry. If he was this close to breaking down, he could only imagine how close she'd be. He had to be strong for her... to be her rock for once.

"You were dead in mine," she said the words as if she were speaking of ordinary every day events. And it almost fooled Alistair for he could feel the pangs of hurt pulling at his insides before he realized that she was crying. Not the sobs or wracking gasps as one might expect from a young girl, nothing so overly emotional as that, just simply tears welling up and pooling over.

"Elissa," he began slowly, his fingers brushing the salty wetness from her cheeks, "You were dying in mine..horribly."

Her lips moved, forming words, but the voice to power them - that strong, commanding voice that always took charge of everything and made things right - was gone. They both knew the dreams were just that, but they burned and carved a good chunk of their hearts every time they had them. This time it was even more brutal, more vicious because it was aimed at them... at what they held dear. Each other. She brought up a hand to cover her eyes, but Alistair's fingers caught them, pulled it back against his bare chest. "I swear," and his voice shook with feeling, "I will NOT see you die."

"And I the same." Surprisingly quick instinct there and just as corrosive as strong acid mixed in. "But if you think you're going to die for me, you have another thing coming."

If he could have snapped his fingers in mock playfulness, he would have. Instead, he said quietly, "Well, now that we got the nastiness of this nightmare out of the way, I must say You dear Lady read me so well. I don't get how you do that."

"I listen, Alistair. And I watch." She made to sit up and the blanket they'd been sharing pooled into her lap as if it were silk instead of the faded, moth eaten wool it was. If the agitation from the dream still bothered her, she hid it now. The tears were a thing of the past... they _hadn't happened. _"Insight is not so much a difficult thing as the art of understanding what's going on around you and dealing with it accordingly."

"Ah," he replies as if he were a sage experiencing enlightenment on the highest mountain top, "It's that thing you do where I talk a lot and you actually pay attention. Gotcha." Even in the dark of the tent, there was enough light filtering in from the fire outside that he could see the outline of Elissa's firm and supple body. The very way her breasts rounded visibly and the curve of her belly dipping low beneath the blanket and... and... Already he found himself uncomfortably reminded by exactly how much her body caused a reaction in his.

Her laugh was so warm and teasing that he shot embarrassed eyes at her. "I know what you're thinking right now. After that nightmare, you still want to-?"

"I, well I mean... that is..." Flustered and red faced, Alistair lifted his arms with a resigned sigh. "I am. Can you blame me, Elissa. You're so very beautiful and you're mine." There's so much revealed in those words that for a brief moment Alistair found his heart beating fast in his chest. Harder than when he was dreaming. "I am a lucky man who hopes his luck will continue to thrive throughout the night." And he's relieved that most of his face is shadowed in darkness. He hopes that the possessiveness he just showed isn't something that might offend. Is it a left over side effect from the dream... to claim what is his by right... to reaffirm that everything is right in the world?

"Some may argue," she begins lightly, her voice a tickle against his ear, "That I am the lucky one."

"What? Who?" And then it dawns on him, "Oh you mean you're thinking that. Really?"

"And some may further say," and this she says as he feels her drawing close to him, her arms wrapping themselves warmly around his own, "that our child will be so lucky to have both his or her parents."

"Yes... wait, did you say child?"

Author's: Random Dribble #3

Just bored one day and decided to give myself a little exercise to do. Honestly, I know they say Wardens can't have kids, but I think both Alistair and Elissa, because they're so recently Grey Wardens, have a chance where others may not. Also since the majority of Grey Wardens are always male, it's a hard thing to test to see if they're right. Who knows, eh. (July 21, 2010)


End file.
